Reflecting on the once-in-a-lifetime sale, Mr Bainbridge said: “In terms of turnover, this is a lifetime’s takings. There is no getting away from it: this is an awful lot of money and I have not got my head round it yet."

He added: “I will try to keep my feet on the ground - but they may be just a little better shod.”

The firm will take a gross income of around £12m, which is comprised of the premium of 20% paid by the buyer (£10,105,000) plus the seller's premium, which is not known but experts said was likely to be around 5% (or £2.15m).

To put the figure into context, Sotheby's and Christie's, the auctioneers, separately had a day's sale of Chinese items this week, which fetched around £14m and £13m respectively - in total.